Animation of MAVEN orbiting Mars

This is an image of the ultraviolet “nightglow” in the Martian atmosphere. Green and white false colors represent the intensity of ultraviolet light, with white being the brightest.

Following liftoff of the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution, or MAVEN, spacecraft from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden congratulated the agency and contracto...

Robert Lin, the late director of the Space Sciences Laboratory, discusses how NASA's MAVEN spacecraft will study the interaction of the Martian atmosphere with the solar wind. MAVEN's findings will...

About 1000 Viking Orbiter red- and violet-filter images have been processed to provide global color coverage of Mars at a scale of 1 km/pixel.

This artist's concept depicts NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) spacecraft orbiting Mars.

This is an artist's conception of Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution Mission (MAVEN) Mars orbiter.

The MAVEN spacecraft is moved into the Thermal Vacuum Chamber (TVAC) at Lockheed Martin on May 16, 2013.

This photo taken on March 3 shows the large hydrazine propellant tank prior to integration with the core structure of the MAVEN spacecraft at a Lockheed Martin clean room near Denver.

Members of the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) team celebrate at the Lockheed Martin operations center in Littleton, Colorado, Sunday night, after getting confirmation that the space...

This is an artist rendition of NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution, or MAVEN spacecraft orbiting Mars.

This is an artist's conception of NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution MissioN (MAVEN) Mars orbiter.

Scientists think that the collision of neutral hydrogen molecules may have helped to drive the Martian atmosphere into space over billions of years.

Inside the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, engineers and technicians test deploy the twin solar arrays on the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution,...

This artist's concept depicts NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) spacecraft orbiting Mars.

This image is from a scientific visualization of the electric currents around Mars.

In the Launch Control Center at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, agency and contractor managers and engineers monitor progress in the countdown to launch the Mars Atmosphere and Volatil...

Download a PDF of the Explore Mars Sticker.

The United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket lifts off from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station carrying the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution, or MAVEN, spacecraft on a 1...

NASA's MAVEN spacecraft obtained this ultraviolet image of hydrogen surrounding comet Siding Spring on Oct. 17, 2014, two days before the comet's closest approach to Mars.

This illustration shows the MAVEN spacecraft and the limb of Mars.

This ultraviolet image near Mars’ South Pole was taken by MAVEN on July 10 2016 and shows the atmosphere and surface during southern spring.

These images from the Imaging Ultraviolet Spectrograph on NASA's MAVEN orbiter show the appearance of a bright aurora on Mars during a solar storm in September 2017. The purple-white colors shows t...

This artist's concept depicts the early Martian environment (right) - believed to contain liquid water and a thicker atmosphere - versus the cold, dry environment seen at Mars today (left).

Artist’s rendering of a solar storm hitting Mars and stripping ions from the planet's upper atmosphere.

In the late evening hours of August 2, 2013, the MAVEN spacecraft arrived on the Shuttle Landing Facility at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.